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What operating system do you use and what do you make your pics with?
I'm on Windows. I think it's the latest Windows, or close to it, but don't know what the number is. I started using Krita to make the pics starting with that one you said was not a jpg. Before that it was MS Paint.
 
I think that is highly likely. In future make sure you convert your pics to jpg. You can easily do it online.
Ok. It's weird, because Krita says they are converted to jpg. I guess Krita is... wrong. Is such a thing possible?
 
Yes. Krita saves as .kra format which is massive and you then let it convert to jpg but that method clearly does not work properly. None of my computers recognize the converted image format. Use a simple image converter before uploading.
 
I’ve had difficulty on occasion and I believe it’s because at that moment the site is overloaded and slow, especially when the thread page has a large number of pics already and CF is busy loading them. I found that if I go away and then return everything works fine. That’s what it looks like to me anyway. But I’m no computer geek.

That's so true of a lot in life.

Of course, in my case it's because everyone has left.
 
And my Linux machine identified it as "hng-jpg." I didn't know about this type of file before.
There are quite a few variations on the jpg format, and not all of them are well supported, with certain software updates breaking compatibility on both sides. I tend to stick to the original legacy jpg format where possible as this is compatible with everything and has been since it first appeared towards the end of the 80s or thereabouts (I was using an Atari ST back then)

The problem is that its often impossible to determine which jpg variation a given piece of software is exporting to until you start running into problems. The only issues i really get with jpg files is if I try to open a jpg downloaded fromm google images in an old piece of software (Microsoft Publisher 97 being the worst offender for this - a piece of software that I use regularly (via a Windows virtual machine in Linux, as it doesn't work properly in WINE, although it used to until a WINE update broke it). My solution is to use another equally old piece of Windows software - ACDSee32 - to convert the jpg to a jpg, overwriting the original file, and this will then load into absolutely anything, as, being from the mid 90s, ACDSee32 exports in legacy OG jpg format.

Don't be tempted to use later versions of ACDSee32 though, as they all come with buily-in spyware (Aureate / Radiate in all the ones I'm aware of, but the original ACDSee32 is 100% clean and works fine on all versions of Windows from Win 3.1 right up to windows 10 - it might work on Windows 11 too but I haven't tried that as nobody I know uses it - most people I know (assuming they use Windows at all) are using Windows 7, with just a couple of gamers on Windows 10, and quite a few now have Linux Mint as their daily driver, as I do)

Of course jpg is still by far the best format for image sharing, regardless of its variances, which is a lot more than can be said for that most vile abomination of all image formats that is .webp - whoever invented that one really belongs on a cross :mad:
 
I also use Linux Mint and this hideous webp format can be converted to jpg with Gimp. So far it's worked fine for me, but it's annoying. :smiley_1140:
Yeah it's not a difficult workaround, but frankly in this day and age we really shouldn't be needing workarounds :(
 
There are quite a few variations on the jpg format, and not all of them are well supported, with certain software updates breaking compatibility on both sides. I tend to stick to the original legacy jpg format where possible as this is compatible with everything and has been since it first appeared towards the end of the 80s or thereabouts (I was using an Atari ST back then)

The problem is that its often impossible to determine which jpg variation a given piece of software is exporting to until you start running into problems. The only issues i really get with jpg files is if I try to open a jpg downloaded fromm google images in an old piece of software (Microsoft Publisher 97 being the worst offender for this - a piece of software that I use regularly (via a Windows virtual machine in Linux, as it doesn't work properly in WINE, although it used to until a WINE update broke it). My solution is to use another equally old piece of Windows software - ACDSee32 - to convert the jpg to a jpg, overwriting the original file, and this will then load into absolutely anything, as, being from the mid 90s, ACDSee32 exports in legacy OG jpg format.

Don't be tempted to use later versions of ACDSee32 though, as they all come with buily-in spyware (Aureate / Radiate in all the ones I'm aware of, but the original ACDSee32 is 100% clean and works fine on all versions of Windows from Win 3.1 right up to windows 10 - it might work on Windows 11 too but I haven't tried that as nobody I know uses it - most people I know (assuming they use Windows at all) are using Windows 7, with just a couple of gamers on Windows 10, and quite a few now have Linux Mint as their daily driver, as I do)

Of course jpg is still by far the best format for image sharing, regardless of its variances, which is a lot more than can be said for that most vile abomination of all image formats that is .webp - whoever invented that one really belongs on a cross :mad:
I swear some of you just don't like change. Running your mouths about all kinds of things.

.webp is actually a good format. It's open, for one, and not proprietary, it's not based on a closed patent like JPEG (since expired). GIFs are horribly outdated, only support a limited color space, badly optimized for compression, and frankly never natively designed for looping video. PNG was originally made to replace GIF as a file format, and mostly did, with the exception of animations. The majority of internet GIFs on big sites have been quietly replaced with "gifs" that say they are .gif files but are really .webp or .webm files. I remember when webm was first introduced; the images we much clearer, smoother, and has a full color gamut, at the same size of .gif files. The switch to .webp on saves SO MUCH bandwidth, you have no idea.

The worst part is that people are upset about this! There are multiple apps and websites for converting webp to gif, the inferior format. It's pure reactionary idiocy. All of the complaining about the different formats and versions of jpeg (supporting or not supporting HDR, lossless compression, transparency, etc), or the issues with just how damn outdated the gif is -- both solved with a new format.

JPG should never be used to replace a .png illustration file if you can help it. JPG is a photo compression algorithm, not a general compression algorithm, and might just add noise and artifacting to an otherwise clean illustration. I've seen good art ruined by bad jpg compression. PNG will actually compress line art, and in a superior way every time, especially if the line art was originally done on a digital canvas. And it can be lossless. For original works, quality matters.

.webp is the usb-c of the filespace right now. Deliberately developed to be the new open standard to fix an existing clusterfuck. The future will, of course be AI-driven image compression at far higher rates possible by current standards, but in the meantime, .webp is a suitable stopgap measure. The perfect is often the enemy of the good enough. The only issue is the lack of support, imgur doesn't do webp uploads yet!
It's a matter of the resolution. 5518 x 6050 Pixel is to high for Xenforo and really oversized for web-graphics.
Typically I work in resolutions like that, the downscale it to 2/3rds or 1/2 when I'm doing digital art. Higher resolution is almost a necessity for painting like that; Back when I was working with 1k or 2k images I'd often be adjusting individual pixels! So this is definitely his "original". I grew up in a time where you'd never be able to share your photoshop orignials, so I'm more accustomed to downsizing as a step in the process. As for shrinking the images, It's not about "fitting on screens" or anything like that. I actually figure that most people now have 1080p or 4K monitors; it's about file size more than anything; high megapixel images have a tendency to show as files and not images. for renders I go lower by default, often at the ideal "finished" resolution, since each pixel represents a real cost to the time to render the image, even with a powerful GPU.
 
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Alright, I decided to do a little bit of an experiment, using my NYE image as a base. Here is the results of various image-compression systems in different file formats, all uploaded to my server.

Starting with our highest possible quality, the image with no compression applied to it at all, the fabled "lossless compression" if available, uncompressed if otherwise. All images are in the native 1536x1920 resolution.

PNG: With compression to "0" (off) I was unable to upload, exceeded file size limits 11.2mb in size

JPG: No lossless compression available, images compressed by default

GIF: No lossless compression available, images compressed by default, limited color gamut

WEBP: Lossless compression at 3.11mb

Now we move to "typical compression". I tried to shrink the file sizes while making minimal sacrifices to quality. For each file format, I specified 90% image quality in GIMP, although that means different things to different codices.

PNG: compression to "9" at 4.48mb

JPG: 100% quality (lossy, still has artifacting) at 3.16mb

JPG: 90% quality at 823kb

GIF: No high quality compression

WEBP: 90% quality at 457kb

Now we get to the worst-case use cases, heavy compression. In this case, I set them all to 40% compression except GIF. You can see much more visible banding of colors in the images now. I wouldn't think any of these images are good looking at this point, and they are not much smaller than the 90% .webp which is almost indistinguishable from the lossless file to a typical eye.

PNG: No further compression possible

JPG: 40% quality at 281kb

GIF: No small file size compression either

WEBP: 40% quality at 148kb

And finally, we reach the bottom of the barrel, where we scrape every single last detail out of the image to try and get the smallest possible file size. I've seen a few JPGs like this in the wild, but they are mercifully getting rarer.

PNG: png is not GIF, it would never stoop this low :p

GIF: Default Quality at a staggering 1.06mb
(this is why you never use gif for images!!)

JPG: 10% quality at 120kb

WEBP: 10% quality at 82.1kb

I won't make any further comments, and let you see the effects of the various types of compression on file size and image quality, and decide for yourself which one to use
which is webp if it's supported. :p
 
You know what the real frustration with webp is? It's not the format, it's the lack of fucking support! Xenforo doesn't support it natively, despite being a considerably more useful file for internet forums than jpg. This is Juan's art, saved in a webp format, at 281kb, still with the dimensions he wanted, a 5k image, with no loss in perceptual quality! Support this image format, you cowards, move on to the future, instead of using image file formats from the FUCKING 1980s and early 90s.

Really I'd love for AVIF files to be more widely supported while we are at it, AVIF is GREAT if you have a good encoding machine. It's quite intensive though, takes like, acutal time to compress an image. Or... a file format for natively layered images (like psd or xcf or kra) that was compressible and portable, or HDR/EXR files that are internet sharable without crushing all of the detail out.

Now, since I'm on my future kick, and bitching you all for thinking that jpgs are good (they were... for about 20 years), I'll actually tell you how I think this is going to go. Right now images are compressed and sent, and the tradeoff is between file size and image quality. I don't think that will be the case for much longer, and here's why. In the near future images can and will be stored as instructions, and re-generated with high fidelity using decompression algorithms. The fundamental architecture of stable diffusion was based a glorified denoiser; generative AI will play a role in image compression. Now this isn't exactly something I expect many people to get excited about, but it is something I am looking forward to.
 

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